Mail delivery generally involves a postal employee delivering mail to a rural or suburban mailbox. While most if not all mailboxes are equipped with a flag that can be raised to signal to the postal employee that outgoing mail is present for pick-up, less common are devices to signal to tire home or property owner that mail has been delivered to the mall box. Without such a device, the addressee generally has to walk out to the mail box to check for delivery. When there has been no mail delivery, such trips can be inconvenient, and for some people—such as the elderly or handicapped—possibly overtaxing.
Mailboxes come in differing types and styles. Generally a standard roadside mailbox has an open housing or chamber with a hinged door at one end, placed near the road, with top, side, back, and bottom walls. One type of distinction in mailboxes relates to the presence or absence of a lip portion. On mailboxes that lack a lip portion the edge of the door is generally flanged such that when closed the door sits flush against the body of the mailbox. On the other hand, mailboxes that have a lip portion generally have a recessed space between the door and the front edge of the lip portion of the mailbox.
Prior mailbox signaling devices of various types are known, for example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,082,170; U.S. Pat. No. 4,702,411; U.S. Pat. No. 4,798,326; U.S. Pat. No. 3,866,823; U.S. Pat. No. 4,728,028. These and other devices presumably provide some degree of benefit as a mail delivery signaling device. However, prior devices are either complex in nature or designed to work only with a specific type of mailbox. Thus, there remains a need for a simpler mad alert device that is easy to install and use, is cost-effective, and can be adapted for use on different types of mailboxes.